He had been left unbound as they descended into the valley and, deciding that he must follow a policy of boldness, he leaped off the pony when they entered the village, just as if he were coming back home. But the old squaws and the children did not give him peace. They crowded around him, uttering cries that he knew must be taunts or jeers. Then they began to push and pull him and to snatch at his hair. Finally an old squaw thrust a splinter clean through his coat and into his arm. The pain was exquisite, but, turning, he took her chin firmly in one hand and with the other slapped her cheeks so severely that she would have fallen to the ground if it had not been for the detaining grasp on her chin. The crowd, with the instinct for the rough that dwells in all primitive breasts, roared with laughter, and Will knew that his bold act had brought him a certain measure of public favor. Heraka with a sharp word or two sent all the women and children flying, and then said in tones of great gravity to Will: "Here you are to remain a prisoner, the prisoner of all the village, until we choose your fate. You will stay in a tepee with Inmutanka, but everybody will watch you, the men, the women, the girls and the boys. Nothing that you do can escape their notice, and you will not have the slightest chance of flight." "If I am to be anybody's guest," said Will, "I'd choose to be old Dr. Inmutanka's. He has a soul in his body." "You are not a guest, you are a slave," said Heraka. Will did not appreciate the full significance of his words then, because Inmutanka was showing the way to one of the smaller tepees and he entered it, finding it clean and commodious. The ground was covered with bark, over which furs and skins were spread and there was a place in the center for a fire, the smoke to ascend through a triangular opening in the top, where it was regulated by a wing worked from the outside. Inmutanka, who undoubtedly had a kind heart, pointed to a heap of buffalo robes in the corner, and Will threw himself upon them. All the enormous exhaustion of such a tremendous journey suddenly became cumulative and he slept until Inmutanka awoke him a full fifteen hours later. Then he discovered that the old Indian really knew a little English, though he had hidden the fact before. "You eat," he said, and gave him fish, venison and some bread of Indian corn, which Will ate with the huge appetite of the young and strong. "Now you work," said Inmutanka, when he had finished. Will stared at him, and then he remembered Heraka's words of the day before that he was a slave. He was assailed by a sickening sensation but he pulled himself together bravely, and, having become a wise youth, he resolved that he would not make his fate worse by vain resistance. "All right," he said, "what am I to do?" "You be pony herd now." "Well, that isn't so bad."